Slade started singing when he was 8 years old, and began playing the piano at 11, after temporarily losing his voice. He wrote his first song when he was 16 and learned to play guitar when he was in high school.[2]

Slade joined Ember, a band which consisted of Slade and his future band-mates Dave Welsh and Ben Wysocki. The band soon dissolved, and later, in the spring of 1999, Slade ran into former school-mate and vocalist/guitarist Joe King in a record store.[3] The two began regular jam sessions, which led to writing songs. They later added Slade's younger brother, Caleb, on bass and Zach Johnson on drums.

Dave Welsh and Ben Wysocki re-joined Slade and King, to form the Fray. They soon released Movement EP, and in 2003, they released Reason EP to some local critical acclaim, particularly by Denver's Westword alternative newsweekly.[4][5] Despite these reviews, the band struggled to launch a single. Denver radio station KTCL rejected eight of their songs before the band decided to submit "Cable Car". The song found airplay on a KTCL radio show highlighting local bands and the radio station received a large number of requests for it soon thereafter. The band changed the name of the song to "Over My Head (Cable Car)", and by the end of 2005, it had become KTCL's most played song of the year.[6]

Slade stated in an interview that one of the first songs that inspired him was "Swallowed" by Bush, and that the lyrics and tune had moved him enough to pursue his career.[11] In a post on AOL Radio Blog, he wrote:

"As a boy 'Swallowed' was my siren's song. I was a sheltered church child and here's this man talking about living the life his way, doing whatever he felt like doing. Bush wasn't allowed in my house either, which made it that much more mysterious."[12]